M25 on Sat I was driving in the inside lane at about 65mph - only about an hour's drive. I felt a bit sleepy so I turned up the aircon and the radio. Next thing I knew I was on the hard shoulder having been woken-up by the rumble strips. I quickly managed to get back on line with no mishaps.
I must be getting older because this has never happened before. If I have been in the fast lane it could have been nasty. I had my two youngest in the back. Scary moment.
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Have a word with your Doctor as your body may be trying to tell you something in relation to blood sugar? or
Carbon monoxide from the exhaust entering your cab?.
Get it checked out pronto.
DVD
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As well as DVD\'s suggestion, you could be suffering from Sleep Apnea (www.google.co.uk will tell you more). Has anyone ever complained that you snore?
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This may just be simple tiredness. As DB confessed he did get the normal body warning signs and the brain did its job by telling him ie "I started to feel sleepy"
This raises an interesting question. When you get the warning signs, and you are on a longish stretch of motorway without a junction or service area, how do you keep awake? Would plod react kindly if you stopped on the hard shoulder and wandered up the bank?
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I do a lot of miles, often late at night. I can't say I've actually stopped on the hard shoulder, but I have stopped in many places. I often stop for a 30 minute snooze and always find them pretty good about it.
The only times I have been asked to move is when they know of a more suitable place to stop close by.
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I came back from Devon this Sunday - about 200 miles - and twice stopped for a half hour snooze as I was feeling incredibly sleepy. I doubt I was in danger of nodding off but vision was getting a bit blurry just before each stop. The half hour snoozes did the business though.
What I did notice was that the service stations allow you to stop for an hour or two. Any longer and you get charged (presumably a lot). Although I can understand the desire to prevent camper vans and others using the services as a free sleep over, this does seem to go against the governments advice to kip if you get sleepy. Guess you have to do like I did, and kip for 30 minutes every hour or so.
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When driving all night through France last year I found I couldn't remember the last 20 secs and so on.
I pulled over at one of the many rest stops 'aires',I think they were called and had 40 winks and felt o.k. afterwards.
The problem in this country is as has been said there is nowhere on a motorway to stop.
The goverment is always making tv ads about not driving when tired, wouldn't it be a good idea to not spend so much on advertising and spend some money on rest stops etc.
It's not rocket science. ( just in case any politician's are reading this)
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Many years ago, I felt really tired driving up the A12. I remember nodding off and thinking how silly it was, so took the next available exit. I must have fallen asleep again as I woke up as I hit the roundabout at the top of the slip road.
The only damage was the front suspension and drive shafts, but it was such a tremendous shock when considering "what if" that I never drive when feeling fatigued now.
It's a shame that life throws it's events before you accept that it *can* happen to you.
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Used to adopt the stop and sleep bit when got tired. Trouble was as others point out the beneficial effects of the sleep can be short lived.
Now thanks to SWMBO recognised a different strategy.
As soon as you begin to feel weary, ie well before the eyelids drooping stage you stop and have a short kip. At a services is obviously the best place.
Then when you've woken up go in and have a proper meal, seems to correct all the body imbalances, blood sugar whatever. After that its like a new day.
The key factor is getting the grub inside, strange but it works for me anyway.
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Glad you're all OK Dogbreath - very humbling to think that your lives were probably saved by a thin strip of crinkly white paint !!
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ps - another good reason for driving in the inside lane !
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Off topic, but why is lane 1 referred to as the inside lane? To me inside lane suggests lane 3 i.e. the so-called fast lane.
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I've always thought similarly that the lanes were named illogically. Where I live it is indeed the case that the lane nearest the kerb is called the outside, or "slow" lane and the others are referred to as center and inside or "overtaking" lane respectively.
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